roten

Happy New Year! Have you ever wonder why new years is actually celebrated nearly a month after January 1? It’s because they celebrate the new year according to the lunisolar calendar, verses the solar calendar which deems January 1 as the first day of the new year.  Another little information is when you ask someone their birthday they tell you their birthday according to the lunisolar calendar – so it actually changes EVERY year – it was hard enough for me to keep up with birthdays based on the solar calendar I’m not even attempting this!

I ventured out downtown with a friend to take some photos of the crazy fireworks.  It’s not like America where the government deems one spot for fireworks.  EVERYWHERE had fireworks! A local said that the average family spends about $150 on fireworks each year.  Our city just renovated the main square downtown and it was so beautiful! The colored lights along the water added a nice touch to the fireworks.

Those fireworks were so close to the tall apartment buildings you see!

This is right outside our kitchen window!

There were fireworks throughout the night (even before it was dark!) but there was nothing like 11:50pm-12:30am. For that entire period it seemed that every family in our city was letting off their entire stash. Guess what? Phoenix slept through all the explosions – I guess we can stop whispering when he’s sleeping now!

Here is a video that I took from our porch during the big spectacle.  It starts off with the sky lighting up and then the building across from ours in our courtyard lefts off some big ones.